After over a decade of resistance, I finally caved and bought a new TV. I’ve had the same old 57-inch TV (you can tell how old it is since they haven’t made anything in that size in forever) since my second apartment in my current city and, until very recently, I never felt an actual need to upgrade. I was never far enough away from my TV that I wanted it larger (and frequently felt that anything larger was too big for comfort). There was nothing wrong with my old TV, so there was no problems I had to put up with. Hell, it was even one of the last few TVs with both component plugs AND no “smart” features, so I had everything I could want in a TV and nothing more! It was a great model! Unfortunately, after splurging on 4K monitors for my computer, it has been difficult to go back to my old, HD TV and enjoy looking at what feels like a fuzzy picture. I’ve been able to not think about it sometimes, but anything that showed up on my monitors was impossible to enjoy on my TV afterwards, thanks to the noticeable drop in quality. Now, though, I’ve fixed that. I bought myself a 4K TV and a pretty decent one at that, thanks to some good sales. It is, unfortunately, a “smart” TV and it is, unfortunately, a bit too big for the space (as it is a 65 inch TV), but it doesn’t have any “AI” features and it’s a workhorse samsung model, so it should hopefully last me another decade unless some of the pixels start dying on me or whatever happens to “Crystal UHD” TVs.

Much like my Switch 2, buying a new TV was a choice of convenience with thoughts of future economic uncertainty in mind. Currently, even after spending a bunch of money out of my entertainment budget for a new Switch 2 console, I had enough to splurge on a TV. Throw in some extra discounts from a random “TV Sale Event” and some bonus cash as a result of buying my air purifiers last week and the situation hit the point where it would have been unwise NOT to take advantage of the deal. You’ve gotta strike while the iron is hot! Or, you know, buy while the random sale is active. I mean, I was only even looking at TVs over the past few days because I got the marketing email, so it clearly wasn’t some BS meant to take advantage of me already scoping out TVs. I bet there’s going to be a new model or something coming out soon since it really felt like my local bestbuy was trying to eliminate as much stock as possible (there were TVs EVERYWHERE when I went into the store to make my purchase), but that made it the perfect time to buy. And the perfect time to remind myself of my unparalleled ability to assess if one object will fit inside a limited space without needing both objects to be in the same place (I had to measure it to prove it to the sales guy that it would fit before he’d stop trying to set up a delivery date, but I knew that it would fit from the get-go).

But! Since I’m buying this at an advantageous moment rather than to meet a specific need, the massive box for this new TV is just sitting on my couch in my TV room, leaned against the wall. It’ll take some genuine effort to shuffle things around enough to get a new TV into place, especially since my new TV is larger than my old one and things are already a tight fit (my most recent instance of knowing things would fit perfectly prior to this TV box and the trunk of my car was this entertainment center, my old TV, and the speakers from my sound system). I’m going to probably need to move my speakers someplace else, at the very least. Still, it’s not an issue. I was already going to need to do a degree of this work already, thanks to adding another console to the group. I still don’t know where I’m going to stick my Switch 2 and while I am tempted to just put it next to my OLED Switch, I’m not sure I want both those little heaters jammed up in the same cubby. I’ve got other cubbies, I’ll just need to figure out another way to store my Switch game boxes. Or maybe I’ll just pack my PS4 away. It’s not like I’ve actually gone back and played any of my old PS4 games on it. I don’t think I’ve actually gone back and used it for anything at all, now that I think about it. Maybe that should get tucked away. Or moved wherever I’d going to put my old TV to act as the DVD/Blu-Ray player for it. Still not sure where that’ll end up… I don’t exactly have a space for it.

I’m sure I’ll figure something out, though. I’m certainly not going to just throw it out. It still works just fine, even if the quality isn’t what I’d like anymore. Worst comes to worst, I’ll just donate it. I’m sure the local humane society would love a TV they could just sell as-is, in at least decent working order. Or maybe I’ll shuffle my TVs around, moving the 32-inch from my bedroom to my Old Game Console setup, put the 57-inch in my bedroom, and toss, recycle, or donate my ancient 19-inch TV (which will officially be old enough to drive in July) [this will not work since the 57-inch is far too big for any surface in my bedroom, so it’s back to the drawing board]. I don’t know. I was kind of in a hurry to act on this idea I’ve had for a couple years now, of upgrading my TV situation, and I didn’t really have the time or energy to plan everything out during the too-short and too-exhausted evenings I’ve had since I made the decision two days ago (as of writing this a week before it posted, anyway). I’ve got all the time in the world. It’s not like I need to replace my TV, after all. I can be as slow as I like about it. Which, you know, is kind of the luxury of buying something before you need it. I can just do stuff on my own time and don’t need to desperately get things done during my currently exhausted and too-short evenings. It’s nice. Much nicer than replacing my old computer while worrying that it was going to die any minute.